TOP #2: Adopting a Puppy for Your Lifestyle

In this second episode of Theory of Pets podcast, I'm taking a step further with discussing puppy adoption. If you're ready to adopt a dog or an adult dog, are you sure that the pet you've chosen is going to fit your lifestyle, your place of living and your temperament?

Too often new pet parents look for a certain breed and make their choices for the wrong reasons. This can be due to breed stereotypes or simply because they thought that specific breed would be cute to have at home or has a very unique and interesting look. Unfortunately, these are not good reasons for adopting a specific dog breed.

Many pet owners bite off more than they can chew (no pun intended)! Naturally, when this happens, pets need to be rehomed or returned back to the shelter or rescue organizations from which they came from. This doesn't do good for anybody, and nobody wins in this situation: not the owner, not the dog and not the shelter.

To prevent these dog adoption mistakes from happening, we can all do our part to research the dog breed that we’re thinking of adopting to make sure it will fit our lifestyle and the needs of our family. That's what we're talking about in this week's podcast episode: finding a dog that will match your environment, your character, your energy levels and your general lifestyle. We also discuss the importance of understanding specific breed's grooming needs, affection level, trainability and other significant traits.

Listen to the episode in the video above and find the full podcast transcript below. For more, visit this episode's post on the official Theory of Pets website.

Adopting a Puppy for Your Lifestyle(podcast transcript)

Adopting the wrong dog for you

All too often I have family friends, I know people – readers of my site and people who I come across in the pet industry when we're talking – so many people say either “I have this dog and they are more than I expected”, or I “have this dog and they were really hoping to get a lot more out of the relationship.”

We know many many people who have gotten dogs that don't fit their lifestyle and the dog needed to be re-homed or taken back to the shelter or rescue organization that it came from which is heartbreaking to me. I always feel really bad when somebody adopts a dog and welcomes them into their home and the dog finally has the loving forever family and then it ends up turning around and having to go back to the shelter or rescue organization it came from.

In the long run it is certainly what's best for the dog, and I'm not in any way shape or form saying that that should not be done if a dog does not fit your lifestyle, absolutely re-homing or returning the dog if you have that option is going to be the best choice in the long run for both you and the dog. But the best thing that you can do so that that doesn't happen and you never have to go through that and the dog never asked to go through that is to do a little bit of research, spend some time thinking about it.

If you wake up on a Saturday morning and decide that you think that your family should have a dog and your family's ready to adopt a dog, don't go out Sunday afternoon and adopt a dog. Take time, think about it, this is a decision that really needs to involve every person living in your house from children to adults, anybody with any type of special needs whether you might have an older person living in your home who has a bit of a hard time walking and maybe an active dog that's going to be running around underfoot is not going to be a good fit. You need to think about every aspect of your home, your lifestyle, your family.

So I want to discuss that today and certainly again I welcome comments from you guys or questions, if there's anybody out there listening who might happen to work for a rescue or a shelter or an organization that places dogs with families and is really an expert in this area. I would love to hear from you as well and maybe I'll get the chance to have you on a future podcast. I encourage feedback, and my hope for Theory of Pets is that it's going to grow into not just a podcast for me talking to all of you but into a community of pet owners and pet lovers who really want to come together to help each other care for their pets in the best way possible.

If you have any stories, if you have any comments, like I said, questions, you can find us at TheoryofPets.com, and there is a section there to record your questions and your comments, there's also a comment section where you can type that information out if you're not comfortable with recording it, which is totally fine. Either way if you get back to me I'm very very happy to include that in my future podcasts, as well as help you one-on-one and get you the information that you're looking for if it's not answered in this podcast.

What's the best dog for your environment

I'm going to move along and just talk a little bit about the environment that you live in, that's a big part of adopting a dog that a lot of people I think don't take into consideration.

Most people think that they want a certain breed, they want to dog that looks a certain way. “Oh we have to get this one, he's so cute,” but they don't take the time to think about what really matters in the long term. Are you going to have a cute dog that everybody at the dog park is just drooling over?

Sure that's great, it's nice to have a dog that looks unique, that has a unique coat or a unique face that draws people's attention. Absolutely, I can understand why some people would go for that, but in the long run that's not what's going to matter for you and it's not what's going to matter for your dog. You need to think about those long-term things that are really going to affect how you care for this dog in the future and how the dog fits into your home. Because not only do you want to be happy with the dog that you choose but you want the dog to you choose to be happy in your home as well.

One of the important things to think of first off is the size of the dog that you want. When you're thinking about this maybe you just have a personal preference of a small or a large dog and that can certainly come into play as well, but you also want to think about the environment that you live in and the size of the dog that you can accommodate.

If you live in a small one room apartment, a Great Dane is probably not going to be a good choice for you. If you have a home, for example we live out in the country, we have a large home with nine acres of land so we have plenty of space, a Great Dane would certainly be fine for a home like ours if we wanted a dog that size.

Now when you're thinking about size obviously the smaller a dog is the less food they're going to eat, the less grooming they're going to need, the easier it's going to be to care for a smaller dog, it's going to be easier to travel with a smaller dog, so these are things to think about.

I know a lot of people with Great Danes, the Bull Mastiffs, the Saint Bernard’s. They get a lot of attention for their size, people think that they're great, they're really cool and they want a dog that size, but you need to think about the long term of it where if you have a Great Dane or you have a Saint Bernard you're going to have a very hard time traveling with a dog that size, if you're somebody that does travel with a dog.

Think about a Saint Bernard's coat, all of that hair, and you're not just a little small dog with a big shaggy coat, you're talking about a huge massive dog with a big shaggy coat. It's probably a dog that you're not going to be able to be bathe in your bathtub at home, you're going to have to be that dog outside. It's going to be a lot of extra work and additional things go into that.

Think about the size of the dog, not only that you want but that you're capable of caring for and the size of the dog that's going to fit best with your home environment. So that's one thing to think about, and when you're thinking about this, like I said, think about the type of home that you have.

Do you have a single wide trailer that's in a mobile home park and you maybe only have a quarter of an acre of land? Do you live in a small apartment where you don't have any land and you're going to have to walk this dog on a leash out on the street in your city? Do you have a home like ours, are you in a more rural setting with a large piece of land where your dog's going to have some more space? You know rural versus urban is a big aspect that will come into play when you're thinking about what type of dog to adopt.

And then the other thing you want to take into consideration which I think falls through the cracks a lot when people are thinking about adopting a dog is the weather in your region. If you live in a very hot humid climate, do you want to get a Husky? Maybe not the best choice. If you live in a climate like we do, we live in Maine here, the winters get very very cold, a lot of the small breed dogs that live in our neighborhood we see all bundled up in the wintertime.

They're wearing boots, they're wearing sweaters or jackets because it's very cold here. The temperature drops below zero during the day in the winter months sometimes, and you know if you have a small dog with a very thin coat or barely any hair at all, think of like a Chinese Crested that's nearly hairless. That's going to come into play depending on the climate that you live in.

If you live in Florida, maybe that's going to be a good choice for you but if you live in Maine, a Chinese Crested might get a little chilly in the wintertime. Not saying that you can't adopt a dog that's not going to be suited for the weather in your area, but think about how you can accommodate that dog.

For example, if you really want a Husky but you live in a very hot climate, are you going to be able to provide air conditioning? Are you going to be able to help that dog stay cool or is your dog to be outside for long periods during the day? If he is, then you certainly don't want to subject a dog with a big thick fur coat like a Husky to the warm humid climates in your region, so that's something to think about.

New dog and your current lifestyle

One of the biggest things that I always tell potential pet owners to think about before adopting is the time that your dog will be spending alone. This is so huge I think especially in today's society where we have most homes are either single-person homes and that person works out of the house, or they are two people or more family homes. But everybody needs to work in the economy the way it is now, it's very rare to see people that stay at home anymore.

If you do stay at home or you work from home or you have a job where it's more flexible, that's great. If you have a job where you're gone eight or ten hours a day, what are you going to do with this dog? Are you going to kennel your dog? Are you going to be able to… can you afford doggie day care so your dog can go and play with other dogs while you're at work?

That's going to determine, one, in my opinion whether you should even adopt a dog in the first place because if your dog is going to be alone for long hours and you don't have the option to hire a pet sitter or a dog walker or take your dogs a doggie day care, that's probably not the best lifestyle for a dog to begin with. So maybe you should think about waiting until you have a bit of a more flexible schedule and can spend some more time at home with your dog.

But if you are able to hire a dog walker or a pet sitter, something like that and your dog's home for long periods of time, that's great. It just will be an added expense that you need to figure in before deciding on which dog to adopt.

And then the other thing is if you're going to be out of the house. For example I work from home but our dogs are alone sometimes. Sometimes I go and run errands. My husband is in the military so he is very rarely home, he is home for a few weeks a year so it's usually just me when I have to go and run errands, go to a doctor appointment, run my children around to their sports games and things like that.

Our dogs are at home by themselves, usually it's no more than a couple hours at a time, but we do have to plan for what we do during those times when the dogs are alone. And certainly there are some dogs that have are more prone to separation anxiety, they're more prone to destructive behaviors. There are dogs that are more people-oriented that want to have that human companionship more than others. If your dog is going to be spending a good deal of time alone maybe it's better to look at some of those breeds that aren't as attached to human companionship as some of the others.

Your new dog's energy levels matter

The next thing that you want to think about, which kind of goes hand in hand with the time that you have, is the energy level of the dog that you're going to have. Now if you're adopting a puppy, chances are your dog for at least a couple of years is going to be fairly energetic, most puppies are.

If you adopt an older dog, an adult dog, that kind of comes with the breed, certain breeds like Labradors are known for having more energy than others and that's something that you want to take into consideration. When you're thinking about the time that your dog's going to be spending alone you also want to think about the time that you have to devote to playing with your dog and to exercising your dog.

We have a chocolate Lab, Sadie, she is a wonderful dog. Before we adopted Sadie I had been a longtime Boxer lover and we had one Boxer in the past that was very high strung but for the most part we've had three Boxers over the last decade or so. They were all females so that might have made a difference, but they were all very mellow, very laid back, they certainly had that Boxer wiggle and got excited to see us. But because I stayed home they get to wander around our yard and they burn some energy and they are very mellow dogs, so we are used to the mellow dogs.

We understood because we did the research before we adopted Sadie, that Labradors are a high energy dog so I knew going into it that Sadie was probably going to take more of my time than our boxers had in the past, and that proved itself to be very much true. I spent – and this is not an exaggeration – hours every day playing with Sadie. She's only one year old so we spend a lot of time playing fetch, playing tug-of-war.

We do have another puppy who she wrestles with for hours every day. It's very time consuming when you have a dog who has a lot of energy because you are the person, if you have a multi dog household you may not be the only one that entertains them but the adults in your household are for the most part the people that entertain those hyperactive dogs.

So you're going to be playing fetch, you're going to be playing tug, you're going to need to: One, to make sure that you have the time to do that and you can devote to that, and that you're committed to devoting to that because it's not fair to the dog if you don't. And you also need to make sure that you can budget for that stuff.

For example with Sadie versus our old Boxers I have already in the first year bought Sadie more toys than I had bought any of our other boxers in the entire span of their lives. Sadie shreds toys, she destroys toys, we spend a lot of time playing with toys so we go through a lot of dog toys. That's an expense that needs to be in our budget.

Other factors to consider before adopting a dog

So there is that, and then you also want to think about the level of affection of the dog that you are thinking about adopting. As I mentioned previously with the time that you have and the time that the dog is going to spend alone. There are certain breeds that enjoy being with people more than others, some breeds are more independent and they don't mind doing their own thing or being alone for a while you're gone to work and things like that.

There are some breeds that are very very attached to people and they want to be with you all the time and they want to make sure that they always have human companionship. Now it may be just that you end up having a sad dog when you're gone from home all the time, or it may be that you have a dog that's going to pick up some bad habits because he's alone and he's angry at you, he's alone and he's bored. That's something that you really want to take into consideration. That affection level, how much of a people dog do you want.

Do you want to dog that's going to be in your face wanting attention and affection all the time or do you want a dog that's going to maybe spend a little bit more time doing his own thing independently?

And you also want to think about the grooming maintenance. This is a big part of adopting a dog. I hear so many people say that they want a smaller dog with short hair or they want just a short-haired breed because the grooming is going to be less.

Now while it's true that the grooming is going to be less as far as the coat is concerned, if you have a dog for example our Boxer with short hair, and a single coat does not require nearly as much maintenance as our double-coated Lab who sheds profusely. And you can also get dogs with longer coats that need more maintenance so that they don't get matted and tangled and things like that. It's definitely if you get a short hair dog it's less maintenance on the coat front but you want to think about some of those things that are maintenance based that every dog is going to need.

Dental care. You're going to need to be brushing your dog's teeth and caring for his oral hygiene. Ear cleaning – some dogs are prone to tear stains and they need to have their face groomed to be rid of those tear stains. Some dogs, there is a difference, many people don't realize between hair and fur.

Some dogs have fur and what that means the difference between fur and hair, fur stops growing at a certain length. For example our Boxer, she's short-haired, her hair grows to about an inch long and then it stops growing, it falls out, new fur grows in its place. Some dogs have hair, and hair like our hair, continues to grow, so these dogs are going to need hair cut.

Some dogs have facial hair that continues to grow that they need. Schnauzers come to mind that they need their faces trimmed or they get these big saggy eyebrows that are in their face and they have the beards that get tangled and yucky with dog food and water and that kind of stuff.

There is nail trimming and there's lots of different things as far as grooming is concerned that aren't necessarily coat related, and it's things that you're going to need to think about. Are you prepared for that? Is it something that you're prepared to do at home?

I have figured out that doing the home grooming for all three of our dogs and doing it all myself. I clip their nails, I clean their ears, I've spent some time learning how to maintain their coats. It's taken some consultations with groomers and talks with my veterinarian. I watched videos online and done a lot of research, but I do all their grooming myself and it saves us hundreds of dollars a year, but it's also time consuming.

Do you have the time to groom your dog at home or are you going to need to take your dog to a professional groomer? If you need to take your dog to a professional groomer, is that money in your budget? And it wouldn't hurt before you bring the dog home, think about the breed that you're going to get, the grooming that it's going to take, go have a conversation with your local breeder.

If it's going to cost 40 or 50 dollars every time you bring your dog to the groomer and you have to bring him to the groomer once a month, $50 a month is $600 a year, do you have that extra $600 a year in your budget for just that dog grooming expense? There's still going to be shampoo and dog brushes and things that you're going to need at your home to care for your pet in between those grooming sessions. Think about those expenses and base your choice on that as well. The level of maintenance that you can either perform on your own or afford to have done.

Like I said with our Boxer, Chloe, she has a single coat, it's short hair, she does require some grooming during shedding seasons and of course that regular grooming that all dogs need between the ear cleaning and the nail trimming and that kind of stuff, but as far as grooming goes she's a very low-maintenance dog to groom. If you want say a Golden Retriever, they have that nice long beautiful coat that people are often in awe of but it takes a lot of maintenance for that.

If you don't brush your dog regularly with the proper brushes and use the proper tools your dog is going to end up matted and tangled, you're going to have to cut their fur. So it's really something that needs to take a lot of consideration, just because a dog is adorable and you like the way that it looks, some of those dogs have that unique look because they're groomed to have that unique look and that's something that you'll have to consider.

The other thing you want to think about, and I touched on this briefly before, is the other pets, family members, and people in your home. Do you have a home where people come in and out? Do you own an in-home daycare or some kind of in home business where people are coming and going from your home every day, or if you're a contractor, do you have clients that come to your house for meetings and things like that? So are there other people that are coming in and out of your house? Are there people in your home with special needs?

Like I mentioned, if there's somebody elderly living in your home are you going to be able to have a dog that's kind of running around and everywhere? Small children same kind of things to consider, and other family members, this needs to be a decision that your family is… everybody's on the same page with. Are other family members going to participate in helping with the dog? Is it something that other family members want?

If you have a family member in your home that isn't keen on having a dog, this might be something that you want to take a little bit of time and think about it and maybe do at a different time when that person isn't in the home anymore. You really… everybody needs to be on the same page when it comes to adopting a dog.

That's something to consider as well as the other pets in your home. Do you have a cat that doesn't want any other animals in your home? Do you have a dog who really is more independent and likes to spend time on their own? One thing that comes to mind for me is older pets, a lot of people think that when their dog becomes older and they now have a senior dog and they know that their time with this dog is running short they think that they want to adopt a new puppy. It's going to make the transition when the older dog's gone and it's going to be easier for the puppy to learn from the older dog how to behave, and there's all these reasons I hear from people who have senior dogs and think that getting a puppy is going to be a benefit to them.

But how does your dog feel about that? And you know your dog better than anybody. If you've had a dog in your home for eight or ten years you know that dog well, is that dog older but still has some spunk and still likes to play a little bit? Do you have an older dog that's very nurturing?

Maybe it's a dog that's had puppies in the past, that's very nurturing and caring and you think would do very well with a puppy? Think about a puppy, think about the jumping and the chewing. Oh my gosh, our little beagle puppy, sometimes our chocolate Lab even will get burnt out and she's taking a nap or our older Boxer, she's six, and she'll be sleeping and our puppy is just climbing over the top of her and chewing on her ears and biting her tail.

These are the things that you want to make sure that other pets in your home are going to be able to deal with another dog. Maybe you have a cat that you don't think a puppy that's pouncing it and chasing after it and things would go over well, but if you adopted a more mellow adult dog that would be something that would be all right with your cat, or an older dog, maybe you have a senior dog who wouldn't be able to deal with a puppy but if you adopted an adult dog that was more mellow you think he would be okay with that.

Your dog, the animals that you have already are part of your family and they need to be comfortable with this decision just like all the other human members of your family. So keep your pets in mind, any other members of your family and anybody with any special needs like children or elderly family members that might be in your home.

Along with this comes protective, how protective do you want the dog to be? You know if you have small children, do you want a dog that's going to be extremely protective of your home that nobody's going to get in there? Do you want a dog that's going to be more of a family dog that's a lot more mellow and easy going and laid back but maybe not the best protector? So that's something to think about and something to be very very cautious of.

Whether you're adopting a puppy from a breed that's known to be more protective, or whether you're adopting an older dog and the shelter said he's a very good dog but he is very protective once he gets used to you and your family and you become part of his pack he becomes very protective. So that's something that you need to take extremely seriously and something that you really need to put some thought into.

Train-ability is another thing that you want to think about as well. Do you want a dog, for example a Border Collie, very very intelligent breed that can be trained to do very very many… a large number of things from household tasks to, and this is just something maybe you don't necessarily want to dog that can turn the lights on and off. But do you want to dog that can be trained to do household tasks like that, bring you in the newspaper, get your slipper, that kind of stuff, or do you want a dog that wants to be… you want to train it to be an agility dog? A dock jumping dog, a hunting dog?

Think about the trainability that you want. Our dogs are well-trained, the one thing that's big for me and for our family is behavior training, all of our dogs go through behavior training and the puppies we're still working on because it's a process, but we want dogs that are going to not jump, we have kids in our home so there cannot be any jumping.

Again we have kids in our home so there are certain times where people are sleeping or we need things to be quiet, we don't want to dog that's barking all the time unnecessarily. Our dog needs to be well-behaved on a leash, our dogs need to stay in our yard, our dogs need to know a few commands, and not a lot, but we want a dog that's going to be able to learn to sit and stay and come when they're called.

So it's more behavior training and we don't really expect the more advanced things like agility training or hunting training or any of that stuff; but if that's something you want then you're going to need to make your selection based off the trainability that you're looking for in a pet as well.

Costs of owning a dog

And then finally, and the thing that I want to leave you with today because it's the thing that I find to be the most important, the thing that I preach most often to potential pet owners and the thing that I think we need to do as a community of pet owners and people in the pet industry. I think we really need to work on educating potential pet parents of all the costs of a dog and how important it is to pick a dog that will also fit your budget and your income.

So obviously there are some things, I know some people as soon as I say this they start talking to me about how dogs are unpredictable, you never know when certain emergency vet visits or things like that are going to come up, and that's true. However, there is still a way to pick a dog that's going to meet your budget.

We've discussed grooming costs, I mentioned feeding costs, smaller dogs cost less to feed, there are dogs where again, if you want to dog that's going to be very trainable, maybe you want to train for agility or train for hunting, that stuff's not free, it costs money, it takes time, you need material, even if you can do the training yourself. But odds are if you're going to do any extensive training you're probably going to work with a professional.

I think I actually just mentioned that, but that those hours that your dog's going to be alone, are you hiring a dog walker or a pet sitter? Are you bringing your dog to doggie daycare? Those are expenses that you can think about before you bring your dog home.

And some people say with food you don't know, well you do know, if you're going to be getting a small breed think about the food that you want to feed. Now you should be feeding the highest quality diet that you can afford, and that five-dollar bag of store-brand dog food at your local convenience store is full of fillers, artificial ingredients, junk that your dog doesn't need, and it carries little to no nutritional value.

So you want to be looking at the food that you want to feed, and say you want to be feeding your dog a higher quality dry kibble that's costing you $30 a bag, think about the breed that you want, go into the store, it will take you five minutes. Walk into the pet food section, look at the bag of food that you want, look at the feeding requirements.

If you want say a beagle or a Mali, she's going to weigh about 20 pounds when she's fully grown, so okay for a 20-pound dog this is how much I'm feeding twice a day, this is how much is in a bag, this is how long this bag is going to last, and you can figure it out. You don't need an exact figure but you want to get a ballpark of how much is this dog going to cost you for the things that you know you're going to need.

Those grooming expenses, the daycare expenses, think about the supplies that you're going to need and that you need for any dog – bowls, food, treats, leash, collar, harness, that kind of stuff that any dog would need.

Now that you can get a ballpark of what you're going to need maybe per month or for example the first month's going to be very expensive because you're going to be buying supplies that your dog needs that you don't have to buy all the time like bowls, leashes, that kind of thing. That first months may be a little expensive so you want to figure that out. And then figure out how much is it going to cost you to take care of this dog on average every month, and then you'll also want to think about the things that you don't know right off hand.

Some vet expenses you can factor into that, given cost, I guess we can call it, of how much you know it's going to cost you, things like your yearly checkup, rabies shots, things like that you can factor. But you are going to have some expenses pop up when your dog gets sick, when he breaks a leg, there's an emergency vet visit something like that where you also want to have enough money set aside in a savings account or be able to squirrel away $50 a month or whatever. It is for those expenses that pop up that you don't know about.

I will give you an example that thank goodness did not happen to us but it did happen to one of my mother's Labs. She has a black Lab who as a puppy ate a tube sock and she actually swallowed that tube sock whole. When the vet removed it there was a little chew marks on one end but she swallowed this tube sock whole and it plugged up her intestines and they had to go in for an emergency surgery and have this tube sock cut out of her intestines. That's something that no matter which way you look at adopting a dog that's probably not something that you're going to ever think will need to be done.

And there are other things that may come up. Your dog might have a genetic disease which hopefully if you're adopting from a responsible breeder you already know that, but if you adopt an adult from a shelter it could be an adult onset disease. It could be something like cancer that just comes up as your dog is older, and you want to make sure that you have the money to help your dog in whatever way is best at that time for whatever treatment that that dog needs. You want to make sure that you can give them the care that they deserve.

I would say financial needs to be the number one thing because honestly to just put it very frankly for you, your financial situation is going to make or break whether you actually are ready to get a dog right now or whether you're not. If you cannot afford a dog, do not even think about it.

Make that your long-term goal, start squirreling some money away, put it in a special savings account or a shoe-box in the closet or whatever you want to do, and start saving up your money for a dog. But those initial expenses, you know some people think “Well I can come up with the 600 or 800 or whatever dollars it might be to adopt this, to buy this puppy, or the $300 it's going to cost to adopt this dog from a shelter and I can afford to feed it,” and they don't think about the long term, those unexpected expenses that are going to pop up.

How much it's going to cost to feed this dog every month and how much it's going to cost to buy the supplies that the dog needs, the flea and tick treatments, the regular veterinary care, that kind of stuff. So really think about that and the money that it's going to cost you because that's going to make or break it.

If you think that you're in a financial position to adopt a dog then you need to start thinking about adopting a dog that's going to fit your lifestyle and which breed would be best, or which type of dog which personality. If you adopt a mixed breed adult dog from a shelter maybe you're looking for a certain personality and the shelter can help you with that because they've had experience with this dog and they can tell you that he's high energy, he's low energy, he loves to be around people, he kind of does his own thing a lot, he's very intelligent, very easily trainable, things like that.

Work with the shelter or rescue organization, do some research on your own, find a breed or find a dog that's going to meet your lifestyle because in the long run it's going to make that relationship all the more stronger between you and your dog. It's going to make you happier, your dog's going to be happier and down the road you're not going to get to a point where you realize that this dog just doesn't fit your lifestyle and then you get into the re-homing issue or the dog needs to go back to the shelter or a rescue organization.

I hope that that information was beneficial to you. I hope that you enjoyed it. I hope that if there's somebody out there that is thinking about adopting a dog or adopting another pet that this was very beneficial and or maybe you can pass it on to somebody that you know who might need this information.

Samantha’s biggest passion in life is spending time with her Boxer dogs. After she rescued her first Boxer in 2004, Samantha fell in love with the breed and has continued to rescue three other Boxers since then. She enjoys hiking and swimming with her Boxers, Maddie and Chloe.

Aspiring dog owners often underestimate the cost of dog ownership over a lifetime, sometimes either focusing only on monthly or yearly costs, or overlooking...

Your Ally in Dog Ownership

Top Dog Tips is here to provide dog owners with the most accurate and in-depth tips and advice on dog care, health, nutrition and training from the industry experts – veterinarians, dog trainers, groomers and animal scientists. We help dog owners effortlessly choose the best dog supplies on the market. We buy, test, review and rank pet products to help you avoid the bad stuff and purchase only what's best for you and your dog.